Bird Kid from the Big Apple
by ablondeinaunionjack
Summary: Ever wondered what happened to the bird girl the Flock rescued in TAE? You're about to find out...This is an entry for alicecullen42'a competition. Anything you recognise belongs to J Patterson. On hiatus for the moment.
1. Chapter 1

Alexa's POV

I jumped out of the window, waiting until the very last minute to snap open my wings and swoop upwards into the clear blue sky.

"Alexandria!!" yelled a voice from the house.

I ignored it, instead focussing on the horizon.

"Alexandria Aster! Get down here right now!" demanded the voice.

Not a chance. I lowered my head to make myself more aerodynamic, and upped my speed. There was no way _they_ were going to catch me.

I feel I should probably explain: I am Alexa Maynard, AKA Alex Astra (made that up – it's so much cooler). I don't have parents, I was adopted by an ex-scientist couple from the hell-hole that was called the School. Oh yeah, and I have wings. Thanks to the sick whitecoats at the School, I'm 98% human, 2% avian. Which is just _great_ if I want a normal life. Mrs. Maynard (notice how I don't call her mom? That's because she's a she-devil who forcibly adopted me from my cosy little den in New York) wanted to have me as, like, an exhibit – that's just the kind of sweet person she is. Mr. Maynard couldn't care less. (Also notice how I'm not a Maynard – I do have _some_ standards, and I don't really want to be associated with them). I would have given _anything_ to get away from them. Which is why I was constantly searching for my saviours - the kids who broke me out of the Institute for Higher Living in New York. They had wings too – same genetic mix as yours featherly. I would love to join them, to get away from my "parents"...if only I knew where to find them.

Oddly enough, this was exactly what I was thinking when I saw the Erasers by the edge of the wood.

"What the..."

Hadn't all the Erasers been "retired"? I angled my body to get a closer look, plummeting to the ground. I could just about hear a voice floating up to me as I landed in the large, conveniently placed pine tree for a better look. Part of me (well, alright, most of me), wanted to fly down and give them a good kicking – but I knew it was probably wiser to wait and see how many there were; and, more importantly, why they were there.

"Talk" growled an unmistakable Eraser voice.

When I looked down, I realised that it didn't actually come from an Eraser – these things were sleeker, they looked more efficient; and deadlier.

"Nope" replied a female in a sing-song voice.

"We can _make_ you" snarled another wolf-boy. "You can't withstand us for much longer."

"Well, you'd think so, wouldn't you? But I _very_ much doubt it."

There was an unpleasant _thwack_, and a sharp intake of breath.

"You will talk!" barked the first Wolf-Boy.

"I think..._not_!"

Unfortunately, they were shielding the girl from my view. With a sigh, I realised it was probably my duty to save her. After all, a human against an Eraser? No chance. I took off, and glided down smoothly until I was at head-height. Which is when I kicked Wolfie in the head with both feet. He went down like a tree as I landed next to the other one.

"Hey, dog-breath!" I panted. "Over here!"

He turned just as I raised my fist, positioning himself perfectly to be attacked by me. He got a fist in the face, breaking his nose. Did I mention that I'm really strong? That's one of the positive effects of being a mutant. His eyes widened, and I kicked him in the stomach. Hard. He fell to the floor, clutching his bloody nose. Kneeling down by the tree, I started to untie the astounded girl.

"Who are you?" she asked furiously.

I undid the first rope, and yanked it away from the tree trunk. The girl rolled her neck, showing the red raw scars around her throat.

"Er, hello? I just asked you a question!"

The second rope fell away, letting her breathe properly.

"And I _didn't_ answer!" I replied brightly.

"I don't _need_ your help!" she hissed.

"Really? Oh, fine, I'll just leave you tied to this tree then, no worries."

I pulled away the last two ropes in silence, releasing the moody girl, who stood up and stretched her wings out. Yeah. Her _wings_. I gaped.

"You..."

"Have wings too" she replied. "Yeah."

With that, she turned and started to run into the woods.

"Hey!! Where are you going?"

"To save my flock" she answered smartly, turning her back on me.

There were more like her? I followed her, trying to avoid being decapitated by the low branches which made this place a death-trap. Well, not so much a death-trap as an injury-trap. _Anyway_...There was a huge net underneath the trees, full of angry-looking kids. They were being guarded by three huge Erasers, and two others were holding a scared-looking girl with curly brown hair and worried brown eyes.

"Max! Stay back!" commanded a dark-haired boy from the net. "They'll hurt Nudge if you get too close..."

The girl (who, apparently was called Max) practically screeched to a halt, and then glared at the Erasers.

"Ange..."

Max screwed her eyes up and looked like she was trying to _think_ the Erasers away.

"Er..." I began tentatively.

"Shut up" shot back Max.

"Suit yourself, kiddo" I spat.

She glared at me, a glare which I returned easily. Suddenly, a sweet little voice piped up from the net.

"Stand guard, Max."

She tensed, and I did the same automatically. The Erasers dropped the girl who was, oddly, called Nudge, and eerily went over to disarm their colleagues, then lead them off into the forest. Max hurried over and untied the net, which was fastened at the top like a giant bag of oranges. When the four other kids and their dog had been released, and Nudge had been seen to, Max straightened up and faced me.

"What the heck was _that_ all about?" she demanded.


	2. Chapter 2

**Astoundingly enough, I've actually managed to update this story. Admittedly not very well, but here's the next chapter anyway...**

Alexa's POV

"You're welcome!" I snapped. "I'll remember not to save you from slavering Wolf-Boys next time."

Max moved forward, her eyes glinting dangerously. Now that all the frenetic fighting was over I got a proper look at her. She seemed familiar, somehow, but I couldn't think why. Unless...unless she was from New York. I remembered her eyes in particular – hard, shrewd and brown, like she'd seen too much cruelty in this world. Well, she'd been in the School; she must have seen and felt more cruelty than most normal people have ever imagined. Her wings were like a mirror-image of mine, tawny and mixed with white and about a dozen different shades of brown. There were exactly the same size; I guessed that we were the same age, which would mean that she was sixteen too. It was an interesting thought...maybe this girl _was_ who I thought she was. Before I could think any more about it, Max interrupted me.

"Who are you?"

"Me? Your guardian angel, by the looks of things. Who are _you_?" I countered.

"Don't even try it," growled Max. "What's with the wings?"

"I could ask you the same thing, _Max,_" I responded.

She moved back as though she was having difficulty restraining herself from killing me.

"Two little rules for you, kiddo – one, I ask the questions here; and two, don't _ever_ call me Max. Only my friends call me Max."

"Well, aren't you just a bundle of joy? What can I call you, exactly? Like, are you okay with being called Jimmy? Cos I could do that," I answered, trying to look innocent.

I saw, out of the corner of my eye, that the rest of the `flock' trying to stop themselves from laughing. Great. Whilst they were laughing, they weren't on guard. Max looked feral, though.

"Give it up. What's your real name?"

I put my hands on my hips and stared her down.

"Why should I tell you?"

"Well, we've all got wings," interjected the dark, good-looking boy.

"So?" said Max and I at exactly the same time.

We both glared at each other. This lasted for a few minutes until the boy sighed.

"Give her a chance, Max," he pleaded.

The girl narrowed her eyes further, and then rolled them.

"Fine. I'm Maximum Ride. I have wings. Your turn."

"Alexandria Astra. I also have wings." I looked around. "Who is everyone?"

"Fang, Iggy, Nudge, the Gasman and Angel," instructed Max, pointing to everyone in turn.

"_Right_..." I replied disbelievingly.

She glared at me again.

"Did you escape from the School as well?"

"No, I was born with wings," I replied sarcastically.

"_Look,_" began Max. "We can do this the easy way, or we can do this the hard way. Me, I want to go for the easy option – these are my new jeans, I don't want to get blood on them. The easy way starts with you answering my questions without using sarcasm. Think you can manage that?"

I looked her straight in the eyes.

"What do you _think_?"

She slammed me back against the tree, holding me by the throat.

"Stop being so freaking stubborn!" she hissed.

I could just about make out the dark-haired boy detaching himself from the shadows and coming over.

"Coming from _you_, Max?" he said with a half-smile. "Give her a chance."

With a noise that sounded suspiciously like a growl, she released me, letting me sag against the tree to catch my breath. I cast a thankful look at Fang, and remembered...

_He looked back with dark eyes, already regretting his decision._

"_Sorry," he whispered. "I..."_

"_Fang!" called a female voice from down the echoing passage._

"_I have to go. I'm so sorry..."_

_He ran down the passage-way, glancing back at me..._

I shook my head, and opened my eyes. Max was looking down at me with a less than friendly expression.

"What's wrong?" she asked, not sounding at all concerned.

"Nothing," I replied gruffly, jumping back onto my feet.

"She has wings," mused Fang. "I vote we take her back to Dr. M's house."

Max turned back to him.

"What if she's a traitor? She might work for Itex or something!"

"I like her," commented the pale boy Max's age. "She's like Max."

"She is _not_ like me!" snarled Max. "I am _not_ that sarcastic, or that, that..._annoying_!"

The entire flock burst out laughing, apart from Fang, who merely chuckled. I guessed this equated to the same thing for him.

"Not that sarcastic or annoying?" giggled Nudge, doubled over. "Your middle name is Sarcastic!"

Max looked annoyed.

"Yeah, but..."

She looked around her flock.

"All _right,_" she sighed. "Come on, _Alexandria_. But I'm not promising anything – if we decide not to trust you, you're not staying."

"Hmm, _déjà vu_!" I said bitterly, almost to myself.

"What?" asked Fang.

"Oh, come on," I sighed. "Doesn't matter."

I could see Max and Fang exchanging significant glances but ignored them. I'd had more than my fair share of those in my time.

"Are we going, or what?"

"Yeah. You can fly well enough?"

"Of course."

I leapt up into the air and snapped out my wings, leaving them behind me. I had to find out more about these mutants, especially if they could help me; and if they were the ones I thought they were. If Maximum Ride didn't kill me first.

Max's POV

"This is a stupid idea," I said for about the tenth time in the past ten minutes.

Fang and I were flying in front of Alexandria, having over-taken her so we could show her the way to Dr. M's place; which I was _so_ thrilled about. I didn't like this girl one bit – the sooner we got rid of her the better. If only I could shake off the feeling that I'd met her before...

"She's okay," replied Fang with a shrug.

I glared at him. "You're supposed to be on my side!"

"I am. But I don't see why we shouldn't trust her."

"There are loads of reasons! She might be an Eraser in disguise, she might be working for Itex...you haven't thought this through. I say we ditch her and go home."

"Max, come on." He turned his dark eyes on me and I felt my resistance weakening. "Give her a chance. If you don't like her after a day or so, we can leave her."

I sighed heavily. "I guess so."

This did not feel good. There was something weird and familiar about Alexandria – I felt like I'd seen her before, maybe even spoken to her. But I couldn't remember for certain.  
I heard wing-beats behind me and turned my head to see Iggy flying up next to us.

"Hey," I began.

"Hey. Listen, I think you should calm down about Alexa. I think she might be from the same batch as us."

"_Alexa_ now, is it? And what do you mean?" I asked.

"Think about it. She's sixteen – so are you two. Your wings are practically identical and she broke out of the School in California," explained Iggy. "It makes sense."

"How did you find this out? You've only been talking to her for about ten minutes!"

"Well, I told her about us and she-"

"You what?" I interrupted.

"I told her about us," he repeated patiently.

"Are you mad? The last thing we need is some strange mutant knowing everything about us!"

"I trust her. Angel's read her mind, there's nothing evil in there. I think she's safe," responded Iggy, folding his arms. "If you don't like her, fine. But Nudge and I have decided we're going to keep talking to her."

"Iggy! For God's sake listen to me! Don't trust a random mutant just because she made up a believable cover story! We're going to leave her here and go back to Dr. M's, okay? Go tell the kids."

"Max-"

"Do it."

He sighed, but flew off anyway. Fang gave me a disapproving look.

"What?"

"This is a bad idea," he replied, shaking his head.

"Oh, so you'd rather she stayed and killed us all in our sleep?"

"Max, think about this."

"I _have_ thought about this, and this is my answer."

"This is going to go badly. I know it."

I ignored him. Mainly because I had a horrible feeling that he was right.

**This is a post for Project PULL set up by Bookaholic711. For more information visit my profile. Thanks!**


	3. Chapter 3

Alexa's POV

Watching the tense, quiet conversation between Iggy and Max, I knew something was up. It was more than likely that she was voting to ditch me – I very much doubted she was actually going to lead me back to her house when she didn't know me from any other winged mutant in America. Of course, I couldn't exactly blame here: for all she knew, I was a danger to her Flock. But if I couldn't go back to their house, if I didn't find out more about them, I might never know if they were the birdkids I thought they were. If I missed that chance, I might never know who I was; and if that happened I'd never forgive myself.

"I wonder what they're talking about," said Nudge, who was flying alongside me. She nodded towards where the Gasman and Iggy were whispering intently. "Probably just something about bombs – y'know, they're just _so_ obsessed with blowing stuff up, you think they'd get bored of it eventually but they still spend all their time doing it. I've spoken to Max about it but I think she's just given up now, and oh, what do you think of Max? I guess you two didn't really get off on the right foot, but I think you could be really great friends, y'know, you're just _so_ alike. Just don't make any, like, _moves_ on Fang because Max will actually kill you, she's very possessive but don't let her know I told you that because she thinks that we don't know that she's in love with him, she doesn't even believe it herself really, but we all know it's true, they're just perfect for each other, don't you think?"

I shook myself out of my stupor – this Nudge kid could really talk – in time to realise that she'd just asked me a question.

"Umm…" I replied cautiously. "I guess so. Not having known them for long, I couldn't really say."

"But can't you sense some serious _energy_ between them? They're, like, _so_ intense, I've never heard two people argue as much as they do; well, I say argue, but Max does most of it, Fang hardly talks which is maybe why they're so compatible, because they're like total opposite on some things-"

"Whoa, whoa, wait up." I held my hand up. "Since when did arguing constantly mean that people are in love?"

Her brown eyes sparkled. "You haven't _heard_ them arguing yet. They're just so…I'll show you when we get back to Dr. M's – trust me, you'll understand when you actually experience it. Also, the way you cut in then, you sounded just like Max. You two have to be, like, related or something – or whatever the test-tube version of that would be – I mean, you even look similar!"

"Do we?"

"You've got the same hair, the same wings, even the same body type, you just _have_ to be related. I-"

"Nudge, I need a word," interrupted Iggy.

He avoided my gaze, instead focussing on Nudge. She frowned, and glanced uneasily across at me.

"What is it?" she asked with unusual brevity.

"I need a word," he repeated. "In private." He flicked his eyes towards me again and cleared his throat.

"Why can't Alexa hear?" persisted Nudge.

"Because…you know what, I'm not even going to pretend this is something else. Alexa, Max wants rid of you, she doesn't trust you and she has no intention of letting you get to her mom's house," said Iggy grimly. "I'm supposed to tell everyone and abandon you somewhere so you won't find us again. I'm sorry. If I had a choice, I wouldn't…do this. Sorry."

"No way! _I'm _not leaving her somewhere in the middle of nowhere, she's one of us!"

Much as I hated to admit it, Nudge's words gave me a warm feeling inside. One of us. I'd never heard those words before, not referring to me. It was weird; but in a good way. I wanted to hear it, to experience it again. But thanks to Max that wasn't going to happen.

"Iggy," I said suddenly. "What if you leave me on my own and I somehow find you again, without you intervening at all, if you just tell me which direction I need to go in and what the house looks like? How would Max react to that?"

Iggy put his head on one side, considering it.

"Well, she might try to kill you."

"That's a risk I'm willing to take."

Nudge grinned. "I cannot _wait_ to see that fight!"

"That's right, mock me with my sightlessness," sighed Iggy, folding his arms. "If that fight does happen, I want a blow by blow account of what's happening." He paused. "Actually, no, I don't want that. I want to know when they're fighting and make up my own account of what happens." He grinned evilly.

Nudge smacked him round the back of the head. "Sexist pig."

I couldn't help smiling. This Flock was a pretty amazing thing – like an actual family of avian mutants, if such a thing could exist. And this was the first family I'd ever had chance to join – the first one I wanted to join, anyway. I could easily imagine spending time with them: putting up with Nudge's babbling, learning more about the Gasman and Iggy's obsession with explosive; even getting to know Max a little better to find out if we were as similar as Nudge had suggested.

"Um, Alexa?" queried Nudge, waving a hand in front of my face. "Are you in there?"

"What? Oh, yeah."

"Well, when we drop you off, you'll want to go due north-east, and you're looking for a big house with a pinkish roof, outside the town. I'll leave something outside, something big and brightly coloured so you'll know what to look for, `kay?" she said, smiling.

I nodded. "Sounds good. So now I just pretend to not know about anything when Max abandons me and then catch up with you?"

"Uh-huh," agreed Nudge.

"We'll just play it by ear when you get there, see what happens," added Iggy.

"Okay."

"So, I'll go talk to Max. Don't give us away." Iggy flew off after the head of the Flock, leaving me with Nudge.

"Well," I said. "This could be interesting."

**This is a post for Project PULL, set up by Bookaholic711. For more information visit my profile. Thanks!**


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